Staff Activities

Sigma Theta Tau Induction

In recognition of her service to the Connell School of Nursing, Wanda Anderson, Nursing/Health Sciences Reference Librarian & Bibliographer, was inducted into Sigma Theta Tau as a “Friend of Nursing” in April of 2005. Sigma Theta Tau International is the international honor society of nursing. Alpha Chi Chapter is located at Boston College School of Nursing, Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. Sigma Theta Tau International is professional rather than social and its purpose and functions may be compared to other honor societies. Alpha Chi embodies and shares the founding values of Sigma Theta Tau International... Wisdom, Discernment, Love, Courage, Honor, Service, Professional Endeavor, Leadership and Knowledge. The purpose of Sigma Theta Tau International is to: recognize superior achievement, recognize the development of leadership qualities, foster high professional standards, encourage creative work, and strengthen commitment to the ideals and purposes of the profession.

In
November 2004 Bob Gerrity,
Head of Systems, and Brendan
Rapple, Collection Development Librarian, made the presentation eScholarship@BC:
A Timely Convergence of Institutional Repository, E-Journal
Initiatives, ETDs, and other Digital Publishing Projects at
the SPARC/SPARC Europe Workshop Institutional Repositories:
The Next Stage held in Washington, DC. The aim of the
workshop was to promote understanding of strategies critical
to implementing and managing the successful long-term growth
of institutional repositories. Our presentation focused on
the history and chronology of the eScholarship@BC initiative
of the Boston College Libraries. The goal of this initiative
is to maximize research visibility, influence and benefit by
encouraging BC authors to archive and distribute online both
unpublished work and peer-reviewed publications in an open-access
environment. Our presentation focused on the four discrete
though intertwined projects comprising eScholarship@BC:
the Library-sponsored open-access scholarly electronic journals
(Teaching
Exceptional Children Plus . . . and The
Journal of Technology, Learning, and Assessment); the electronic
theses and dissertations initiative; a variety of other digitization
projects; and the institutional repository itself. The presentation
was well received and there was much interest by the workshop’s
participants in the development, progress, and future plans
of eScholarship@BC.
The workshop had 276 registrants from 184 institutions, 15%
of the registrants being from outside the USA. For more information
about eScholarship@BC contact
Mark Caprio (caprioma@bc.edu;
617 552-6432).

American Library Association Midwinter Conference

Karen McNulty,
Digital Resources Reference Librarian presented
at the discussion group "Metasearch: What It Is, What It Could
Be, and How Standards Can Help Us Get
There" at the American Library Association Midwinter Conference
2005. Karen addressed BC users' experiences with MetaQuest version
2 and how metasearch
standards could improve users' experiences with federated searching.

Electronic Resources in
Communications Studies Committee

Ken Liss, Communication Librarian has been
named to a new committee of the Education &
Behavioral Sciences Section of ACRL, the Electronic Resources
in
Communications Studies Committee. His term begins on July 1, 2005
and ends on
June 30, 2007. Committee meetings will be held at ALA and ALA Midwinter.

Annual Scientific Meeting of The American
Society of Cytopathology

Wanda
Anderson, Nursing
Reference Librarian/Bibliographer attended the Annual
Scientific Meeting of The American Society of Cytopathology in
Chicago. "Current
Issues in Cytology" highlighted "International Efforts to Fight
Cancer" which focused on the multicultural educational programs
needed to emphasize the importance of early screening for the
detection of cancer.